- Conrad Winn -- Affirmative Action for Women- More Than a Case of Simple Justice

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Conrad Winn

m ore than a case of s implejustice

Affirm ative action for w omen:

Abstract The point of departure for this essay is tha t society ought to equalize

income between genders. However, the empirical evidence shows that affirma-

tive action in the federal government, particularly quota hiring, is based on a

false picture of the causes of the gender income gap and on an incomplete pic-

ture of the consequences of affirmative action. The gender gap is not caused

primarily by employer discrimination but by educational segregation and by

heavy and unequal family burdens.The proponents of quota hiring for women overlook the unintended societal

impacts of the program. In the name of equality and justice, affirmative action

does injustice to low-income women, to low-status men, and to mothers who work

at home. Affirmative action also ignores the dilemma of negative fertility and its

implications for pension fundability and the ability of society to care for the aged.

The essay discusses reforms in income taxation, public pensions, education

and job structure as alternatives to quota hiring. These reforms would favour

women while remaining neutral between social classes and between women who

work at home and women in the paid labour force. The suggested changes would

not accelerate the decline in Canada’s fertility rates.

Sommaire : L’auteur prend pour hypothese que la sociktk se doit d‘kgaliser les

salaires entre les hommes et les femmes. Mais s’appuyant sur des donnkes em-

piriques, il montre que les programmes d’action positive au gouvernement fkdk-

ral, notamment les systbmes de contingentement l’embauche, sont fondks sur

m e conception e r r o d e des causes de la disparitk salariale entre les sexes et sur

une image incomplbte des conskquences de l’action positive. Le fossk des sexes

ne rksulte pas principalement d’une discrimination pratiquke par les employeurs

mais de la skgrkgation dam le domaine de I’kducation, ainsi que de l’inkquiti.

dans le partage des tAches familiales.

Ceux qui prkconisent l’ktablissement de contingentements l’embauche pourThe author is associate professor, department of political science, Carleton University.

Tom Workman was research assistant thanks to a grant from the Office of Graduate

Studies. The following individuals kindly provided bibliographic and/or substantive

assistance, but are not responsible for how their assistance was used: Diane Desaul-

niers, Robert Emond, Luc Fortin, Joy Inglis, Jennifer McQueen, Des O’Flaherty, Dhiru

Patel, Myrtle Perry, V. Subramaniam, Jill Vickers, and especially Julia Zackon. On

behalf of Canadian Public Administration, Vince Wilson and an assessor were helpful.

CANADIAN PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION / A D M I N I S T R A T I O N PUBLIQUE DU CANADAV O L U M E 28 NO. 1 (SPRING/PRINTEMPS 1985 , PP. 24-46.



AFFIRMATIVE ACTION FOR WOMEN

Jes femmes oublient les rkpercussions sociktales cachkes d’un tel programme.Au nom de l’kgalitk et de la justice, I’action positive fait preuve d’injustice enversles femmes faible revenu, les hommes bas statut et les mkres de famille tra-vaillant au foyer. L’action positive ignore kgalement le dilemme des indicesnkgatifs de fkconditk ainsi que les rkpercussions de ce phknomkne sur le finance-ment des rkgimes de pension et sur les possibilitks qu’a la sociktk de prendre encharge les personnes Agkes.

L’auteur ktudie les rkformes du systbme fiscal, des rkgimes publics de pension,

de l’kducation et des structures d’emploi en tant que solutions de rechange il’ktablissement de systkmes de contingentement I’embauche. De telles rkformesseraient favorables aux femmes, sans diffkrencier entre les classes sociales, nientre les femmes qui travaillent au foyer et celles qui travaillent h I’extkrieur. Leschangements suggkrks n’accklkreraient pas le flkchissement de I’indice de fkcon-ditk au Canada.

Over the past generation, the various components of the women’s move-

ment have brought to public attention a wide range of injustices. Women

receive less pay in the workforce, do more work at home and are under-

rewarded for their essential roles in family life and in the voluntary sector

of civil society. Because of occupational segregation, women are frequently

paid less than equal wages for work of equal value. They may encounter

sexual harassment at work and less than equal treatment in such diverse

situations as divorce courts and doctors’ 0ffices.l

Women earn much less than men. Whatever the reasons for this eco-

nomic distribution, it is undesirable. Increasing female incomes is a just

goal because economic inequality presents a multiplier effect leading to

sundry non-economic inequalities. Given that women’s unpaid household

and family work may amount to from 34 to 41 per cent of the GNP, it is even

plausible to suggest, as it has been by a minister responsible for the status

of women, that women should receive much more than half of society’s

monetary rewards instead of much lessV2

The purpose of this essay is to examine critically the program of affirma-

tive action for women in federal government employment. Any evaluation

of a program ought to examine the program’s effects and to consider alter-1 A helpful, though slightly dated, review of feminist empirical literature appears in

Pat Armstrong and Hugh Armstrong, The Double Ghetto: Canadian W om en and TheirSegregated Work (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1978).2 For the estimate of the unpaid houyehold share of the GNP, see Oli Hawrylyshyn,Estimating the Value o Household W ork in Canada (Ottawa: Statistics Canada, 1978),p. 33. In the less developed provinces, housework is estimated to represent 50 to 60

per cent of GPP. Homemakers are also responsible for volunteer work not normallyclassed as housework. In a presentation to the Royal Commission on the Economic Unionand Development Prospects for Canada (December 15, 1983),Hon. Judy Erola askedrhetorically, if women continue to do the bulk of child-rearing and housework, “thenshouldn’t women’s share of incomes rise to 75 or more to reflect their real contributionto society?”

25 ADMINISTRATION PUBLIQUE DU CANADA



CONRAD WINN

native means of achieving the program’s objectives; the essay seeks to do

both. It begins by tracing the origin of compensatory discrimination in

Canada and by comparing Canadian and American approaches. Different

explanations for the unequal occupational achievement of women are con-sidered. The federal government’s case for quota hiring is assessed. The

essay identifies various inadvertent and perverse effects of affirmative

action, and concludes by suggesting alternative means of reducing the

gender gap.

Compensatory discr iminat ion inCanada

A difficulty in assessing the federal government’s affirmative action pro-

grams arises from the cacophony of terms. First, affirmative action is almost

always a euphemism for an act of compensatory discrimination whoseultimate purpose is to increase the proportional employment of a target

or beneficiary group. Secondly, affirmative action may refer to a wide

variety of means for increasing the employment of members of the group.

A target group may benefit from a program of affirmative employment by

which specific posts or a proportion of all posts are set aside. A target group

may benefit from a program of affirmative preparation, consistingof special

training opportunities and motivational efforts. Thirdly, the term affirma-

tive action usually refers to all beneficiary or target groups. But in Canada

efforts to help francophones are the responsibility of the official languages

program rather than the affirmative action program.

Francophones were the first group to receive compensatory discrimina-

tion. In 1962, in the face of growing nationalist feeling in Quebec and de-

clining francophone participation in the bureaucracy, a minority report of

the Royal Commission on Government Organization recommended that

“the government intensify its efforts to attract and retain more of the highly

qualified young people of French Canada capable of advancement to senior

rank^. ^ The theme of francophone under-representation was reiterated

more strongly in 1969by the Royal Commission on Bilingualism and Bi-

culturalism. Even before the royal commission reported, the Public ServiceCommission had already heightened its recruitment efforts on francophone

campuses, and line departments made greater efforts to hire and promote

francophones.

In the Canadian government, affirmative action refers to efforts to assist

the public service careers of native people, women and the disabled. “Vis-

3 Canada, The Royal Commiss ion on Government Organizat ion (Ottawa: Queen’s

Printer, 1962),p. 267. A helpful review of affirmative action in Canada, both de fac t0

and d e +re, appears in Morton Weinfeld, “The Development of Affirmative Action in

Canada,” Canadian Ethnic Studies (1981), pp. 23-39. A review of the bicultural ele-

ment appears in the chapter on “Bicultural Policy” in Conrad Winn and John MC-

Menemy, Pol i t ical Part ies in Canada (Toronto: McGraw Hill, 1976) .

26 CANADIAN PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION




ible minorities,” however they are eventually designated by government,

may join the group of beneficiaries in the future. Through the services of

Employment and Immigration Canada, the federal government encourages

private sector firms to adopt affirmative action employment programs pat-terned on the government’s own. The federal government’s affirmative

action programs do not encompass all its efforts on behalf of the designated

groups. For example, the special efforts of Health and Welfare and other

departments to financially assist the training of Native people are not nor-

mally considered to belong to affirmative action. Some of the special train-

ing opportunities available to Native people do not necessarily lead to

federal employment. Some special efforts have been undertaken on behalf

of the black residents of Nova Scotia. Like francophones, Nova Scotia

blacks appear to be treated as a special case outside the formal rubric of

affirmative action.The focus of this essay is quota hiring or affirmative employment rather

than special training efforts or affirmative preparation. Special efforts to

train the members of objectively disadvantaged groups are easier to defend

on grounds of ethics and efficiency than quota hiring. Special efforts to

upgrade the skills of a minority group can be justified by a society’s desire

for equality without having to assume that the inequality in question was

caused by discrimination.

In June 1983, then Treasury Board President Herb Gray gave a major

boost to affirmative action by revealing the precise methods and timetable

by which departments would be required to augment their complements of

women, natives and the handicapped. Henceforth, Treasury Board would

each September announce public service-wide goals. For 1983, quantita-

tive goals were established for women in the Management Category, the

highest category in the public service. Each department was required to

establish quantitative goals for the appointment and promotion of women

as well as aboriginal and handicapped peoplea4

As a prelude to Mr. Gray’s service-wide policy of June 1983, three de-

partments had previously been instructed to undertake pilot affirmative

action projects, Employment and Immigration Canada, the Secretary ofState Department, and the Treasury Board Secretariat were required to

undertake the pilot projects. The three departments established affirma-

tive action units, whose responsibilities were to conduct statistical studies

of the distribution of various groups at various levels in the departmental

hierarchy, to identify and remove barriers to the career success of target

groups, and to recommend numerical goals or quotas for the hiring and

promotion of members of target groups, As a result of the work of its affirm-

ative action unit, Employment and Immigration Canada decided to

“double the representation of women in the Senior Management and Ex

4 Treasury Board of Canada, “A ffirmativeAction in Federal Public Service,” news

release, Ottawa, Ju ne 27, 1983, pp. 31.

27 ADMINISTRATION PUBLIQUEDU CANADA



CONRAD WINN

ecutive groups” in 1983-84 and to “hire an additional 79 indigenous em-

ployees through public recr~itment.”~he department vowed to make

available special training opportunities for native people and for middle

management women. The department’s internal studies found that “targetgroups were disproportionately screened out of competition by the expe-

rience factor.”6As a result, the department vowed to provide its managers

with “strategies for eliminating or reducing the negative effect of such

things as the knowledge and experience factors.”7

Employment and Immigration Canada, otherwise known as the Canada

Employment and Immigration Commission CEIC) is a key actor because

of its role in the pilot projects, because of its large affirmative action staff

and because of its potential role in contract compliance. By fall 1984, about

eighty private firms had received the assistance of CEIC staff in the estab-

lishment of affirmative action programs on a voluntary basis. The Liberalcabinet indicated that it might adopt us.-style contract compliance regu-

lations, requiring firms that do business with the federal government to

undertake affirmative action programs as a condition of businessn8Under

contract compliance, CEIC and the Canadian Human Rights Commission

would have roles in advising and monitoring private contractors. Given

the possible introduction of us.-style contract compliance, it is worth con-

sidering how affirmative action in Canada has been influenced to date by

the American experience as either a positive or negative policy model.

Canadian and Am erican app roachesThe Canadian government has striven to legitimate affirmative action

policies by wrapping them in the mantle of Canadian patriotism. The gov-

ernment portrays its policy as reasonable, flexible and compatible with

appointment according to merit, unlike the American approach. According

to the 1983 Annual Report of the Public Service Commission of Canada,

the government is committed to “a distinctly Canadian approach to the

identification and elimination of discriminatory practices in the work-

place.”D n an address delivered in May 1983, PSC commissioner Jennifer

McQueen reiterated the theme of Canadian distinctiveness:Comparing affirmation action in the United States to that in Canada risks making

an error. In our country, affirmative action does not transgress the Public Service

Employment Act nor the merit principle, and excludes rigid quotas (p . 1) . l0

5 Ibid., Annex C, p. 1 6 Ibid., p. 2. 7 Ibid.

8 Hon.L.Axworthy, Affirmative Action Press Conference,August 1,1980, transcript,^. 3.

9 Public Service Commission of Canada, Annual Report 1983 (Ottawa: Supply and

Services, 19841, p. 16.

10 Jennifer R. McQueen, “Notes for the Panel Discussion on How Affirmative Action

Can Be Implemented Within Merit at the Ottawa Chapter of the Canadian Public Per-

sonnel Management Association,” Ottawa, May 2, 1984, p. 1. Quote was translated

from the French.





In speeches and documents, government spokesmen have repeatedly as-

serted, sometimes in italicized print, that Canada does not use quotas.

The American Heritage Dictionary o the English Language defines

quota as “a share, as of goods, assigned to a group or to each member of agroup; al l~ tm en t. ”~ ~y this definition, “numerical goals” are indeed quotas.

Furthermore, departmental and central agency documents are replete with

information about the percentages of existing and future jobs assigned to

target groups. Whether or not Canadian quotas are “rigid” quotas depends

on the reasonableness and the urgency with which they are required. Rea-

sonableness is a complex issue, as the essay will attempt to show. As for

urgency, Treasury Board President Herb Gray declared in June 1983 that

how quickly deputy ministers implement affirmative action programs “will

be considered a priority item in evaluating th( eir ) performance” (p . 3) I2

Both before and after Gray’s pronouncement, intra-governmental memo-randa were replete with exhortations to departments to fulfill their quotas.

A year before Gray’s announcement, the Personnel Management Manualstated that each department would be evaluated according to its achieve-

ments in “reaching numerical targets.”13

Affirmative action programs are different in Canada and the United

States with respect to the choice of target groups, with respect to the role

of the courts and with respect to contract compliance. The descendants of

ante-bellurn slaves were originally intended to be the main beneficiaries

of affirmative action in the United States. In Canada, special employment

opportunities are being made available for the longstanding black com-

munity of Nova Scotia. However, blacks in Canada were not intended as

the main beneficiaries of either formal affirmative actions programs or the

preferential “official languages” program. Both Canadian and American

affirmative action programs treat women as a beneficiary group. The two

countries differ with respect to the role of the courts and with respect to

contract compliance. American courts have occupied a major role in de-

termining the course followed by affirmative action in the public and

private sectors in the United States. The courts are not yet an important

factor in Canada.The view articulated by the Public Service Commission is that American

programs are less flexible and more rigid or coercive than Canadian pro-

grams. The empirical evidence does not uphold the PSC’S portrait except

insofar as Canada’s private sector efforts are still voluntary. American offi-

cials are just as anxious as their Canadian counterparts to make clear that

their “goals are targets, not rigid quotas.”14 The American programs have

1112release, June 27, 1983 , p. 3.

13tion 5.2. 14 New Yor k Times pril 3,1 98 3, p. 1.

Boston: H oughon Mifflin Company, 1 9 7 0 ), p. 1073.Treasury Board of Canada, “Affirmative Action in Federa l Public Se rvice,” news

Human Resource Usa ge Vo lume, Equal Oppo rtunities for Wo men C hapter, Sec-




CONRAD WINN

followed a zigzag path, whereby the lower courts have ten ded to sanction

affirmative employment program s involving numbers or qu otas while t he

Supreme Court h as tend ed to oppose them. M any of these judicial decisions

are complex. In McAleer v. A . T . b T . (F. Supp. 435, 1976), a District ofColumbia Cou rt required the company to pay damages to McAleer because

he was passed u p in favou r of less qualified, less experienced wom en an d

minority group members, but also forced the company to give back payto women and minorit ies in compensation for past de p ri ~ a t i 0 n s. l~

The statutory basis for compensatory discrimination is weaker in the

United States than in Canada. Affirmation action in the United States is

based largely on Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Tit le VII includes

section 703 , which asserts that nothing in T itle VII obliges an employer

“to grant preferential treatm ent to any individual or gro up on account of

any imbalance which may exist” when the number of employees of suchgroups is compared “with the total number or percentage of persons of

such race, color, religion, sex, or national origin in any such community,State, section or o ther area.”lGAmerican affirmative action acq uired a re pu -

tation fo r rigidity large ly as a result of con tract compliance, fo r which th ere

does not (yet) exist a Canadian counterpart. Universities of the size of

Cornell were reportedly obliged to fill out up to ten thousand complex

forms annually in order to demonstrate compliance with Washington’saffirmative action guide1ines.l’ I n a w ell-known sta tem en t, H arv ard Uni-

versity President Dere k Bok reported being harassed by regulatory officialson detailed matters of hiringsla n mid-1980, a University of Georgia pro-

fessor of education served a prison sentence for contempt of court rath er

than reveal to a judge how he had voted in a closed faculty meeting on

tenure.lg

Although Canada and the United States differ with respect to the role

of the courts and with respect to contract compliance, the affirmative

action programs in the two countries are founded on almost identical

rationales a nd employ similar terms a nd language. Like the U.S. prototype,

Cana dian affirmative action is, in the words of t h e Public Service Com mis-

sion, a “results-oriented a p p ro a c h intended to redress “systemic discrimi-nation in employment practices.”20 Both C ana dian an d American a p-

15 See Nathan Glazer, Ethnic DiZemmas, 1964-1982 Cambridge, Mass.: HarvardUniversity Press, 1983), p. 180.

16 See Thomas Sowell, “Weber and Bakke, and the Presuppositions of “AffirmativeAction,” in W.E. Block and M.A. Walker, eds., Discrimination, Afirmatiue Action, andEqud Opportunity Vancouver: The Fraser Institute, 1982).

17 Carnegie Council on Policy Studies in Higher Education, Making AfirmatioeAction Wo r k in Higher Education San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1975) .

18 Derek Bok in Th e Public Interest Winter, 1980) , pp. 80-101.

19 Daniel Patrick Moynihan, “Washington vs. the Universities” Washington: Ethics

and Public Policy Centre, December, 1980).

20 Public Service Commissionof Canada,Dialogue June, 1982), p. 3.

30 CANADIAN PUBLICADMINISTRATION




proaches assume that discrimination may exist without any evidence of

evil intent to discriminate or any evidence of the unequal treatment of

individuals belonging to different groups. Both approaches place the bur-

den of proof on the employer. The employer must demonstrate innocenceof wrong-doing once there is statistical evidence that the members of

groups designated as disadvantaged are experiencing rates of occupational

success below the rate deemed satisfactory by authorities. In the United

States, firms doing business with the federal government must spend the

100,000plus necessary to validate their criteria for hiring and promotion

if women, blacks and natives do not achieve rates of career success deemed

satisfactory by the contract compliance authority.”21

Within the Canadian government, departments must change their cri-

teria for appointment and advancement or justify these criteria to the

central agencies once they discover that the success rate of a target group

is less than 80 per cent of the success rate of the most successful group.22

Clearly, federal policy assumes that employers and the criteria which they

select are responsible for the under-achievement of certain groups. How-

ever, in the absence of direct evidence that employers and their criteria

are indeed responsible for unequal achievement, alternative explanations

of unequal achievement need to be considered.

Explaining unequal achievement

The adoption of affirmative action programs, especially those requiringcompensatory employment and promotion rather than compensatory train-

ing, reflects the ascendancy of social science thought. One of the most im-

portant principles of social science thinking is the distinction between

manifest and latent function. The manifest purpose of the criteria for hiring

and advancement in any organization is to make the most of human capi-

tal. But these criteria may have the latent effect of screening Gut the quali-

fied members of pariah groups. For example, word-of-mouth hiring in a

firm with an all-white workforce has no manifestly racist intent, bu t it has

the latent effect of reducing the likelihood of hiring non-whites. Govern-

ments have a justifiable interest in inhibiting such practices. The socialscience distinction between latent and manifest functions is valid and

useful. The problem of affirmative action is that it leaps from the reasonable

premise that employment practices may have the latent effect of discrimin-

ating to the unproven conclusion that most, if not all, the difference among

the occupational achievements among groups is determined by the be-

haviour of employers,

The proponents of affirmative employment believe that essentially all

the differences in the occupational achievements among groups is explained

2122Impact on Employment Opportunities” December 6 983), pp.10.

Sowell, “Presuppositionsof Affirmative Action.“Personnel Psychology Centre, Public Service Commission of Canada, “Adverse




C ON R AD W I N N

by discrimination a n d tha t most of this discrimination takes place in th e

workplace. An alternate view is th at much of th e difference in occu pational

achievement is unrelated to discrimination a nd tha t most of th e discrimina-

tion which impedes occupational success and income opportunities takesplace outside the workplace. If this second view is correct, the federal

governmen t in its role as employer is doing injustice t o the qualified mem-

bers of groups not designated as disadvantaged. The government qua em-ployer is likewise do ing harm to t he qualified m em bers of disadva ntaged

groups, whose personal successes are consequently perceived as privilege

instead of achievem ent. By doing little to chan ge th e environm ental bases

of inequality in its role as lawmaker rather than em ployer, the government

is harming disadvantaged groups by failing to help their mem bers achieve

on their own merits. Indeed we know that women and minority group

members who attribute their success to affirmative action are much lesshap py than those who attribu te their success to personal accomplishments,

while those who succeed in the absence of affirmative action are more

highly esteemed by the ir peers.23

Affirmative employm ent rests on th e assumption tha t discrimination a n d

achievement are linearly related: the greater the discrimination, the less

the achievement. Achievement is indeed affected by the presence or ab-

sence of discrimination, bu t the relationship is proba bly curvilinear. A high

level of discrimination, especially in the form of past subjugation, helps to

depress achievement (for example, the case of native peo ple ). A mod erate

amount of discrimination may incite achievement (for example, the Jews,

Japanese an d Chinese of North Am erica ), T h e absence of discrimination

does not produce high achievement, as evidenced by the declining occu-

pational accomplishments of white Anglo-Saxon protest ant^.'^ The Jews,

Japanese and Chinese of North America are abIe to succeed because oftheir family-centred cultural capacity to acquire higher education and

other requisites of success. They are motivated to succeed in order to

acqu ire the material a nd symbo lic sources of security wh ich discriminationmakes necessary a nd which m oney makes possible.25

23 See Thomas I. Chacko, “Women and Equal Em ployment Opportun ity: Some Un-intended Effects,” Journal o Applied Psychology (1 98 2) , pp. 119-23; and Luis T.

Garcia, et al. , “T he Effect of Affirmative Action on Attributions about Minority GroupMembers,” Journal o Personality 1981), pp. 427-37.24 Co nra d Win n, “Affirmative Action an d Visible Minorities: I Assumptions in Questof Evidence,” forthcoming; and Winn, “The Illusions of Affirmative Action: W ho GetsW hat an d Why,” in R. Bilodeau, ed., Human Rights and A firmative A ction (Montreal:Canadian Human Rights Foundation, 1985, forthcoming).25 For evidence of the high achievement of Jews, Japanese and Chinese and the

moderate achievement of WASPS, see Anthony H. Richmond and Warran E . Kalbach,Factors in the Adjustment o lmmigrants and Their Descendants (Ottawa: Supply

and S ervices, 19 80 ) an d Sowell, “T he Presuppositions of Affirmative Action.”





Whether or not a disadvantaged group experiences depressed earnings

and diminished achievement because of discrimination is an empirical

question. The experience of each group requires a separate empirical study.

Women in the workforce are said to be prevented by systemic discrimina-tion in the workplace because their earnings annd rank are much lower

than those of males. However, women on average have fewer of the work-

related qualifications which normally affect personal incomes. On average,

women are characterized by fewer years of education, education which is

less technical, fewer years of experience, lower rates of uninterrupted work,

less freedom from household and family responsibilities, fewer hours of

work per week, a lesser willingness to relocate and reportedly less motiva-

tion.

Ostry, Robson and Lapointe, Holmes, Gunderson, Binder, Ornstein and

other social scientists have employed statistical methods to determine whatportion of the income gap between genders correlates statistically with and

is therefore explained by years of education and other quantitative mea-

sures of work qualification. A major portion of the gender income gap is

explained by different levels of qualifications, The remaining minor portion

of the income gap may be, but is not necessarily, explained by discrimina-

tion at the workplace.26 Ornstein suggests that about one-third of the

gender gap is unexplained by qualifications while Binder suggests that the

unexplained portion may be as low as 15 per cent. Some of the remaining

gap may be explained by the fact that women are normally shorter than

men. Tall men generally earn more than those who are short because of

the psychological advantages of height. A us. tudy shows that a man earns

about 750 more annually for every inch he is above five foot, six inches. A

Canadian survey showed that men earning 25,000 or more were almost

four inches taller than those earning 5- 10,000.27

26 Sylvia Ostry, The Female Worker n Canada (O ttaw a: Information Canada, 1 968 );R. Robson and M. Lapointe, A Comparison of Men’s and W omen ’s Salaries and Em -ployment Fringe Benefits in the Academic Profession (Ottawa: Royal Commission on

the Status of Women, 1971 ) ; R.A. Holmes, “Male-Female Earnings Differentials in

Canada,” Journal of H uman Resources (1 97 6) , pp. 109-117; M. Gunderson, “Male-Female Wag e Differentials and the Im pac t of E qua l Pay Legislation,” Review of Eco-nomics and Statistics 1975 ) , pp . 462-70; M. Gunderson, “Decomposition of Male-Female Earnings: Canada, 1970,” Canadian Journalo Economics 19 72 ), pp. 479-85;M.D. O rnstein, Accounting for G ender Differentials in J o b Income in Can ada: Resultsf rom a 98 Survey (O tta wa : Women’s Bureau, Labour Canada, 19 83 ); A. Binder,

“Wage Discrimination: Reduced Form and Structural Estimates,” Journal o HumanResources (Fa ll, 19 73 ). An elegant review of m uch of the quantitative literature on

ethno-racial and gender wage differentials in Canada, the United States and Britainappears in Harish C. Jain and Peter J . Sloane, Equal Employment Issues (N ew York:Praeger, 1981 .

27 Ralp h Keyes, Th e Heigh t of Your Life (Boston: Little Brown, 1960) and Globeand Mail, July 10, 1980, p. 15. Height probably does not confound ethnicity since




CONRAD WINN

The social sciences are not exact sciences, and so it is difficult to be cer-

tain about precisely how much of the gender gap is explained by objective

differences in qualifications. There are at least three different viewpoints.

One view holds that there is no gender gap, that income differences arefully explained by differences in qualifications and willingness to work.

This view is given plausibility by evidence showing that single women earn

as much or more than single men with the same qualifications and that

women who are willing to relocate do as well as men who are willing to

relocate.**

A second view holds that there is indeed a gender gap, that women suffer

from occupational segregation and that their qualifications are undervalued

as a result. According to this view, women have stronger qualifications than

they are given credit for, with the result that the gender gap as measured is

underestimated. A third view of the gender gap is that women are indeedunderqualified and have poor work performance. According to this view,

discrimination in the schools prevents women from acquiring more and

better education. Meanwhile, discrimination in the home deprives women

of the time and energy for the workplace which are available to men. Fur-

thermore, society does not properly compensate women for the occupa-

tional cost of childbirth and child-rearing.

A recent American study was conducted of unemployment rates among

male and female science and engineering graduates two years after re-

ceiving their bachelor’s and master’s degrees, The overall unemployment

rate was lower among males than among females 3.0 per cent opposed

to 4.7 per cent) . However, women were much more likely to restrict their

job search to certain geographic locations, to part-time work, or for other

family-related reasons. Male science and engineering graduates outnum-

bered women by a ratio of two to one, but women outnumbered men bymore than three to one in specifying restrictions in their job search. Among

those graduates who imposed no restrictions, the unemployment rate

among females was only 1.4 per cent among females as compared to 1.5per cent among males.*gAccording to this evidence, the impact of quota

hiring on science and engineering graduates would be to give an advantageto single females, who do not need it, without satisfying the real locational

and part-time needs of married female scientists with children. The view

that there is really no gender gap is buttressed by the evidence that mar-

Jewish, Japanese and Chinese Canadians, who are shorter than Canadians of northernEur opea n descent, earn more money.28 Thomas Sowell, Afirmatiue Action Reconsidered (Washington: American Enter-prise Institute, 19 75 ), pp. 28-33, passim nd H elen s. Astin, “Career Profiles of Women

Doctorates,” in Alice S. Rossi and Ann Calderwood, eds., Academic Women on theMoue (Russell Sage Foundation, 19 73 ), p. 153.

29 Michael G. Finn , “Understanding the Higher Unemployment Rate of Women

Scientists and Engineers,” American Economic Review 1983), pp. 1137-40.

34 CANADIAN PUBLICADMINISTRATION




ried women in the workforce, especially those with children at home, are

less interested in full-time work, have less time available for work, engage

in less promotion-seeking behaviour, and express less interest in promo-

tion when asked.3OFor purposes of this essay, it is unnecessary to reconcile the three views

of the gender gap because none sees employer discrimination as the central

problem and hence none provides compelling evidence in support of com-

pensatory hiring and promotion, The first view, which emphasizes the per-

sistent occupational success of single women, calls for no action. The sec-

ond view, which singles out occupational segregation as a problem, leads

to a policy of equal pay for work of equal value. A policy of equal pay for

work of equal value would require predominantly male and predomin-

antly female bargaining units to be paid the same wages if their tasks en-

tailed similar importance, but it would not require quota hiring. The thirdview, which identifies discrimination in schooling, in household work, and

in weak government subsidies for child-rearing, requires many policy re-

forms by government, but it too does not lead inexorably to a policy of

quota hiring.

Although the burden of evidence is that employers are substantially

blameless for income inequality between men and women, the preferen-

tial hiring and promotion of women in the federal government might

nonetheless be justified if the federal government were shown to be an

exception. Perhaps Canadian officials constitute a special case of discrimin-

atory conduct. To evaluate this possibility, it is necessary to assess the evi-

dence of discrimination within the Government of Canada.

Evaluating the lo gi c of federal qu otahir ing

The Canadian government justifies affirmative employment or quota hiring

on the basis of statistical analysis. Relatively few women are found in

senior management while the Administrative Support category is over-

whelmingly female in composition. The 1983 Annual Report of the Public

Service Commission explained the government’s special commitment toincreasing the number of senior female officials in the following words:

This year a completely new program designed to improve the representation of

women in the Management Category was introduced. At the end of 1983women

30 Carl Hoffman and John Reed, “When Is Imbalance not Discrimination? in Blockand Walker, eds., Discrimination. See also Women’s Bureau, Labour Canada, “Resolv-ing Conflict between Employment and Family Responsibilities,” in Labour Canada,Sexual Equali ty in the Workplace (Ottawa: Supply and Services, 1982), pp. 123-26.

For evidence that motherhood retards the careers of female academics, see Helen S.

Astin and Alan E. Bayer, “Sex Discrimination of Academe,” in Rossi and Calderwood,Academic Wom en, p. 150.

35 ADMINISTRATION PUBLIQUEDU CANADA



CONRAD WINN

comprised 5.9%of the Management Category, while they accounted for 40.6%

of the entire Public Service (p. 17).

By 1988, the PSC intends to increase the female compIement in the Manage-

ment Category from less than 6 per cent to more than 13 per cent.

If women in the public service were as qualified as men, the high ratio

of male-to-female managers would be appalling indirect evidence of some-

thing wrong somewhere. However, there are very few cases of proven dis-

crimination against women seeking management positions. There are few

proven cases of discrimination by the employer because the real ratio of

men-to-women is much lower once the lower age, lower qualifications and

lower availability of women are taken into account. Managers are not nor-

mally chosen from among the young. Yet female public servants are much

younger than their male counterparts. It is true that 41 per cent of publicservants as a whole are female, but only 31 per cent of those forty years

old and older are female (PSC Annual Report, 1983, p. 61). Managers are

usually drawn from among university graduates with one or more univer-

sity degrees in a specialty having practical usefulness. Among Canadians

with one professional degree in the age group from which managers are

normally drawn, men outnumber women by a ratio of seven to one or

higher in the practical fields of business administration, economics and law.

In engineering, actuarial science and mathematics, the ratios are approxi-

mately one hundred to one, seventeen to one and three to one. By contrast,

women outnumber men among first-degree graduates in fine arts, transla-

tion, library science, household science and social work.31 The traditional

specialization of women in library science and translation is reflected in

the concentration of female public servants in the National Library (71

per cent) and Secretary of State (65 per cen t) , which is responsible for

translation, and in the relative absence of women in departments such as

Energy, Mines, and Resources 2 5 per cent) and Agriculture 23 per

cent) 32

The documents of the public service contain evidence which lends sup-

port to the view that women are, on the whole, less available for andforless single-mindedly committed to the workplace. Women are less mobile

and have received less training,33 especially outside their own depart-

31 These figures apply to 1974 graduates, Since most managers would have gradu-ated well before 1974, our data overestimate the supply of females with practicaldegrees. See Treasury Board of Canada, Equal opportunities for Wo men in the Public

Seruice of Canada 198 0), Table 7.32 Da ta for the year 1980 are taken from Tab le 3 in Treasury Board of Ca nada , EqualOpportunities or W o m e n in the Public Service o Canada (1980) .33 Canada Employment and Immigration Commission, “Affirmative Action Report”

n.d. ), p. 3.





ment.34T he rate of separations is higher among wom en th an am on g men.35

Th e lower comm itment of women to th e workplace ou ght not to b e largely

attributed to employer discrimination, for which the evidence is mainly

indirect. Instead, th e lower commitment of w omen to the workplace oughtto be at t ributed to the unfair and under-rewarded family burdens of

women, for which there is excessive direct evidence. The special family

burden of women is consistent with the fact that female separations are

higher than male separations in every occupational category except theExecutive Category.36 By the t ime a person reaches the top rung in the

ladder, his or her child-rearing responsibilities are normally lessened. The

special family burden of women is also consistent with the fact that the

rate of separations “for personal reasons” among women is almost three

times th a t for men.37

To recapitulate, th e fede ral governmen t justifies quo ta hiring an d pro-motion of women to the Management Category on the basis th at women

constitute only 6 per ce nt of tha t category. T h e 1983 Annual Repmt of the

Public Service Commission contrasts without elaboration or qualification

women’s 6 per cent sh are of m anagement posts with their 41 per cent share

of all public service posts. The implicit assumption is that women const-

i tute 41 pe r cent of the pool of po tential recruits becau se wom en constitute

41 per cen t of th e entire public service. However, if one assumes tha t man-

agers ought normally to be at least forty years old and have a practical

university ed ucation, the pool of fem ales available for promo tionto

man-agement in th e late 1970s and early 1980s is very, very small. Indeed, the

proportion of females available for promotion to managemen t du rin g these

years is probably not significantly larger than the proportion actually pro-

moted.

In th e years to come, the pool of potential female management recruits

will grow enormously as more recent female university grad uate s become

available. Young women are studying traditionally male subjects at much

higher rates tha n they o nce did.38 If th e supply of qualified w ome n for

management positions is much larger a decade from now, this will result

from the educational choices of yesterday’s undergraduates an d from the

34 Treasury Board of Can ada, “A ffirmative Action in Fe deral Public Service,” newsrelease, June 27, 1983, Annex D, “Department of Secretary of State,” p. 2.

35 Treasury Board of Canada, Equal Opportunities for W om en in the Public Seruice(19 80) , Tables 2 and 8.

36 Ibid.37 Employment and Immigration Canada, Afirmatiue Action at a Glance, AnnualReport, 1983-84, p. 17.38 The proportion of female university students g radu ating in chemistry, agriculture,business administration, dentistry and law rose by 50 to 10 0 per cent in th e years 1 974

to 1979. Treasury Board of Canada, Equal Opportunities for W om en in the PublicSeruice o Canada 1980), Table 7.




CONRAD WINN

climate of opinion created by feminist leaders and the mass media; it will

not be primarily due to today’s affirmative employment.

The ongoing decline in educational segregation will help reduce occupa-

tional segregation, which is one of the objective sources of the genderincome gap. The income penalties to women as a result of occupational

segregation will also be reduced by trade union efforts to achieve equal pay

for work of equal value. A policy of equal pay for work of equal value has

the disadvantage of increasing the financial incentives for people to enter

traditionally female occupations which already experience oversupply.

However, the policy has the special appeal of benefiting women who have

low socio-economic status and can only enter the traditional female job

markets. The policy also has the appeal of benefiting traditional family-

centred women, who are apt to re-enter the workforce through traditional

female job markets.The responsibilities of family affect the income-earning capacities of

traditional women in an obvious way; they remain at home with their

children. However, family life affects the income-earning ability of non-

traditional women as well. Indeed, family life is a sufficiently important

factor to deserve a separate consideration.

The significance of family lif eThe most serious impediment to income equality between the sexes is the

inequality of the family burden, more particularly for couples with chil-

dren. Time-use studies show that women carry the lion’s share of family

responsibilities whether or not they are gainfully employed, whatever their

social class and whatever the political system.3DThe very substantial re-

sponsibilities of child-rearing and their unequal distribution explain why

single women achieve more occupational success than married women40

why women in the workforce have fewer children,41 why women with

39 M. Meissner, et al . , “No Exit for Wives: Sexual Division of Labour,” Canadian

Review o Sociology and Anthropology (1 97 5) , pp. 424-39 and M orris Yanovitch,Social and Economic Inequality in the Soviet Union (New York: M.E. Sharpe, 1 97 7) .

See also Labour Canada, Sexual Equality, 125ff; and Ratna Ray, “The Re-Entry ofCanadian Women into the Labour Force,” Women’s Bureau, Labour Canada, unpub-

lished paper, November 1979.40 Sowell, Afirmat iue Act ion Reconsidered, pp . 28-33, See also no te 29 above.41 Tw o useful overviews are Rudolf Andorka, Determinants o Ferti l i ty in Advanced

Societies (Lon don : Methuen, 19 78 ), an d Nathan Keyfitz, Population Change nd Social

Policy (Cam bridge, Abt, 19 82 ). See also L.J. Waite and R.M. Stolzenberg, “IntendedChildbearing - Labour Force Participation of Young Women,” Ame rican Sociological

Review (1 97 6 ), pp. 235-52; James C. Cranier, “Fertility and Female Employment,”ibid (1 98 0) , pp. 167-90; R. Freedman and L.C . Coombs, “Economic Considerations inFamily Growth Decisions,” Population Studies 19 66 ), pp. 177-222; Carl F. Grinstaff,

et al . , “Socio-demographic Correlates of Childlessness,” Canadian Journalo

Sociology(1981 ) , pp . 337-51; Alan Booth and Donna Duvall, “Sex Roles and the Link BetweenFertility and Employment,” Sex Roles 1981 , pp. 847-56.





young children are half as likely to be in the workforce as those without

children4*and why the gender income gap rises to a peak during the child-

rearing years and then declines.43

An American research firm specializing in work on behalf of plaintiffs indiscrimination cases conducted a large-scale study of career patterns in a

large modern U.S. corporation. The research firm’s empirical findings about

the career consequences of parenthood deserve careful consideration:

In general, the effects of parenthood were like those of marriage, only more so.

It increased men’s desires for promotion and their efforts to achieve it, and de-

creased both among women. The male and female clerks in our sample did not

differ in their desire for additional children; 43 of the women and 42 of the

men intended to have them. But the effects would be quite different: 17%of the

women who planned to have children did not intend to remain in the labour force

until retirement; only 4 of the men who planned to have children expressed anintention to leave, a figure virtually identical to those for male and female clerks

who did not plan to have more children. Similarly, 28 of the female clerks who

had children had been out of the labour force in the past, compared to 3 of the

fathers in our sample. . . (C)hildless female clerks, and male clerks whether they

had children or not, were likely to have worked overtime and to report that they

were available for any shift assignment, while mothers of children under eighteen,

not surprisingly, reported less flexibility.44

The empirical evidence of the special responsibility for child-rearing

shouldered by women corresponds closely to public perceptions of the

nature of family life and the work world. Seven out of eight Canadiansbelieve that women should be fully compensated in the event of divorce

for their role in family life, A majority favour paid maternity leave and a

majority favour salaries for housewives with children. A majority are op-

posed to the mothers of young children being gainfully employed. A major-

ity feels that children are harmed when their mothers are in the workforce.

The majority that feels family life is harmed by mothers’ being in the work-

force has remained unchanged in spite of large shifts in public attitudes

towards other male-female issues. For example, the proportion that believes

women to be as capable of occupational leadership as men rose from 58

per cent in 1971 to 77 per cent ten-years later.45

42 Among married women aged 15 to 34 with husbands present, the proportion who

were gainfully employed with children under 6 was 37 per cent as compared to 78per cent among those without children, Census of Canada, Supplemen tary Bulletins:Economic Characteristics, Female Labour Force Participation Rates by Level o School-

ing, Age , Marital Status and Presence o Children, Cat. 94-836. See also Labour Canada,

Sexual Equality, p. 134.43 Ibid., pp. 53-54.44 Hoffman and Reed, “When is Imbalance Not Discrimination,” n Block and Walker,

Discrimination, p. 203.

45 Th e Gallup Report . The release dates for the national polls upon which this para-graph is based are, in order: February 28, 1983; February 27, 1982; May 31, 1975;March 13,1982; January 31,1983; and June 6,1981.




CONRAD WINN

Given the family burden placed on women a nd assuming the need to

reduce income differences between men and women, governments will

ne ed to consider a wide rang e of op tions other than quota hiring, especially

other than compensatory employment practices, during the very yearswhe n ch ild-rearing responsibilities ar e greatest. B efore discussing alterna-

tive policy options, it is necessary to assess th e im pac t of affirmative em-

ployment on factors other than th e gender gap. I t is important to considerhow affirmative action affects the interests of working-class women as

opposed to upper-class women and the interests of women who work athome as opposed to women in the workforce. Finally, it is important to

examine how affirmative action or other government instruments might

affect birth rates, an d it is important to consider how an d why birth rates

matter.

The effects of affirmative actionOne of the most important consequences of affirmative action for womenis to rigidify the class structure and to increase income disparities among

families. The regressive incom e effect of affirmative action is iron ic becau se

the advancement of women is normally portrayed as part of a broader

qu es t for equality in society. However, th e advoca tes of affirmative action

for wom en forget tha t the family, not the individu al, is the be are r of socialclass. Individuals who do not procreate neither en han ce nor diminish th e

income opp ortunities of offspring. The family has impo rtant class conse-

quences because it can transmit status from generation to generation a nd

becau se spouses reinforce each other’s class position.

Spouses reinforce each other’s class position because people normally

marry within their own class. Rates of class homog amy h av e been recorde d

as high as 80 per cent and above. Indeed, class homogamy in marriage is

so strong and unchanging that it is treated as axiomatic in the social

sciences an d sociologists no longer consider it a pressing re search issue.4G

T he workforce participation rates am ong females have increased en or-

mously dur ing th e last generation. If the rates of increased female partici-

pation were t he sam e in all social classes, income in equalities am ong fami-lies wou ld be increasing by only the mag nitude of the income gap s between

high- an d low-status females. How ever, participation rates vary systemati-

cally according to social class, ranging from a high of 71 per cent amonguniversity graduates to a low of 34 per cent among those with grade 11or

46 “Because social class correlates with an infinitude of attitudes and behavior, de-

fiance of its boundaries is uncommon in mate selection.” David Klimek, Beneath MateSelection and Marriage Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1979), p. 19. See also Mildred W.

Weil, Marriage, and Family, and Socie ty The Interstate Printers and Publishers, 1979),

p. 36; and Bert W. Adams, The Family: A Sociological Interpretation Houghton

Mifflin, 1980), p. 236.





less. Among women with grade 11or less in the 25 to 34 age group, 42 per

cent are gainfully employed. The proportion rises to 60 per cent among

those with some post-secondary education and to 74 per cent among college

grad~ates.~7oung women from the working class simply lack remunera-tive skills. If they have young children, they or their husbands cannot com-

mand sufficient income to justify the cost of housekeepers, daycare or paid

neighbours. Daycare centres, whatever their strengths and limitations, are

occupied largely by children from middle-class families.48

Like other women, the woman in the working-class family is enjoined

by the mass media to enter the workforce, but she is financially impeded

from doing so as long as she cares for young children. Her family income

is increasingly constrained as her husband faces competition from middle-

and upper-class women in the workforce. The affirmative action programs

and quota hiring intended to benefit all women have the effect of benefitingupper-status women and their upper-status husbands at the expense of

lower-status males and the women who depend on them as sole family

provider. The sole male income-earner in a working-class family may re-

double his efforts in the face of higher-status females with equal or lesser

formal qualifications. But the sole income-earner must also experience the

effects of the income tax law, which favours two-income families. Because

income tax law in Canada ignores famiIy income, two equal incomes are

a more efficient source of net after-tax family income than one. Attitude

data suggest that working-class women may sense that their own economic

interests are not fully served by occupational efforts on behalf of women

as a whole. Working-class women are less supportive of equal opportunity,

not to mention compensatory discrimination. The proportion of women

who believe that jobs should first go to men during periods of high unem-

47 Statistics Canada, 1976 Census of Canada, Supplementary Bulletin, Economic

Characteristics, Female Labour Force Participation Rates by Level o Schooling, Age,Marital Status and Presence of Children, Cat. 94-836 (Bulletin 10SE7). See also LabourCanada, Sexual Equality, p. 133. The economic analysis of family income inequalitiesought to consider the redistributive effect, the reordering effect, and the life-cycle or

life-stage effect. Most studies ignore the latter and are not directly germane to thisanalysis, which focuses on the earning power of the wives of high and low SES men

durin g the child-rearing years. O n the correlation between husbands’ an d wives’ earn-

ing power, see J. Mincer, “T he Distribution of La bor Incom es: A Survey with a specialreference to the Human Capital Approach,” Journal of Economic Literature 1970),

pp. 1-26. In “Working Wives, Income Distribution and Poverty,” Canadian Public

Policy 1983), pp. 71-80, Robert S widinsky shows tha t wives contribute to inequality,albeit less than their husbands (Table 2 ) . But his analysis confounds life-cycle effects.For evidence that female participation reduced the income share of the lowest quintilein the years 1954 to 1975, see N. MacLeod and K. Horner, “Analyzing Post-WarChanges in Canadian Income Distribution,” in Refkction o n Canadian Incomes (O t -tawa : Economic Council of C anad a, 1979), pp. 3-36.48 Ratna Ray, “The Re-Entry of Canad ian Women into th e Labo ur Force,” p. 23.

41 ADMINISTRATIONPUBLIQUEDU CANADA



CONRAD WINN

ployment is twice as high among those without university education as

among those with (Gallup, April 28, 1979).

In the federal public service, affirmative action programs place a distinct

emphasis on the advancement of the most upper-status of all women, thosebeing prepared for positions in senior management. To the extent that

affirmative action for women takes effect, upper-status men, who are sup-

posed to lose out, are its beneficiaries. Upper-status men experience en-

hanced family income, thanks to their wives, diminished competition from

lower-status males, and only marginal increases in household responsibili-

ties.

The regressive income effectof affirmative action for women is not readily

noticed in Canada because affirmative action is a recent innovation and be-

cause class origins are not readily apparent. In India, by contrast, class is

relatively discernible because of its close link to caste. India has a longhistory of female participation in the bureaucracy and a long history of

quota hiring on behalf of low-status groups. Affirmative action for the

scheduled castes and tribes dates from Britain’s India Act 1937) and from

the Indian Constitution directive no. 4 6 ) . From the outset, female partici-

pation in the higher bureaucracy has been almost exclusively from the

higher castes. Lower-caste male recruits have resented female achievement,

which they have perceived as strengthening the position of high-caste

males.4Q

The regressive income effects of female participation and of affirmative

action can be neutralized without affecting the occupational opportunities

of women, as will be argued below. One of the central goals of government

has always been to contribute to a sense of justice by reducing rather than

increasing income discrepancies. Writing 2,300 years ago Aristotle observed

that it was by then an old-fashioned idea that societies could not permit

the unregulated development of income ineq~al i t ies .~~

It is also the task of government to balance conflicting interests such as

those between women who work in the home and women who work in the

paid labour force. As the Minister of Finance of the Parti Quebecois gov-

ernment in Quebec has observed, it is the task of government to be “neutral. . . [and] not favour one lifestyle over another, and . when establishing

the amount of assistance we can provide to families . it is not for the State

to judge whether both spouses should work outside the home or

Like their working-class sisters, middle-class women who work at home

lose out from affirmative action for their sex. Like their working-class sisters,

49 I am indebted to my colleague, V. Subramaniam, for these observations. See hisSocial Background o India’s Administrators New Delhi: Publications Division, 1971 .

50 Aristotle, The PoZitics Markham: Penguin Books, 1962), translated by T.A.Sinclair, p. 191.

51 Budget Speech, 1981-82, p. 31.





middle-class homemakers find that their family incomes are constrained

at precisely the time when the financial needs of their families are greatest.

However, the motivation of middle-class homemakers to stay at home is

different. Middle-class women become full-time mothers mainly out ofpersonal conviction. They believe that childhood development requires the

intense supervision and psychological bonding that is normally made pos-

sible only by a full-time parent in the home. Some homemakers would enter

the workforce if they could afford a permanent housekeeper. But all they

can afford is daycare, which they find abhorrent because of the institutional

setting and because of transient, overworked staff.

Homemakers produce more children and therefore more future taxpayers

and pension contributors than working mothers.52But homemakers pay a

price for producing this social good. Part-time work is scarce. Income tax

law favours the two-income family. Having stayed home to care for chil-dren at considerable cost, homemakers encounter difficulty re-entering the

labour market and having their skills sympathetically evaluated. Home-

makers produce and rear children who as adult wage-earners pay for the

Canada Pension Plan benefits received by those who had fewer children

or none at all. But homemakers themselves face old age without any of the

benefits being paid for by their own children.53

In view of the financial expense of rearing children and in view of the

occupational cost of doing so, it is surprising that women still give birth.

Indeed, Canadian women are giving birth less and less frequently. The

total fertility rate necessary to replace a country’s population has been

calculated as 2.1. Canada’s total fertility rate fell below 2.1 for the first

time in 1972, and it has declined consistently since then. By 1982, it had

fallen to less than 1.8.54

Canada’s negative birth rate is not as serious as that of some Western

European countries. The West German government is particularly anxious,

having adopted pro-natalist policies for fear of a significant depopulation.

At current birth rates, West Germans may have to pay as much as one-third

of their incomes in taxes merely to pay for pensions.55 Canada may also

encounter a funding problem when the baby-boom generation reaches

52 Andorka, Determinants o Fertility, p. 292; Keyfitz, Population Change, p. 39; and

John Ermisch, “Investigations into the causes of the postwar fertility sw ings,” in D avidEversley and Wo lfgang Hollman, eds., Population Change and Social Planning Lon-

don: Edward Arnold, 19 8 2) .

5 3 For evidence that the CPP is a program for the in tergenerational transfer of incom e

and not an insurance program, see A. Asimakop ulos, “Finan cing Canada’s Public Pen-

sion - W ho Pays?’, Canadian Public Policy 19 8 4) , pp. 156-66.54 Statistics Canada, Vita l Statistics, catalogue 84-204 November, 1978 and Febru-

ary, 1 9 8 4 ). On the 2.1 figure, see Henry S. Shryock and Jaco b S . Siegel, The Methodsand Materials o Demography N ew York: Academic Press, 19 76 ), pp. 327-28.

55 Eversley and K ollman, eds ., Population Changes, p. 390.

43 ADMINISTRATIONPUBLIQUEDU CANADA



CONRAD WINN

retirement. Since countries tend to pay out large pension benefits when

their pensionable populations are large,50 t is important to make sure that

there is a large enough pool of taxpayers and pension contributors when

Canada’s baby-boom generation reaches retirement age. It may be tempt-ing to resort to immigration to make up for an insufficient rate of reproduc-

tion. However, immigrants cannot be expected to graciously foot the bill

for the pension costs of a large generation of pensioners who were not their

biological parents.

To recapitulate, the essay began by reviewing the origins of compensa-

tory discrimination and by examining the sources of the gender income

gap. Two sources of the gender gap are educational and occupational

segregation, which are closely related to each other. Within the middle

class, educational segregation is being largely solved through the educa-

tional choices and efforts of female university students. The most seriousand intractable impediment to income equality is inequality in the home,

specifically the heavy and unequal responsibilities for child-rearing. The

responsibility for replacing Canada’s population falls more heavily on

mothers than on fathers and more heavily on couples who raise children

than on those who do not.

The gender gap must be reduced, but affirmative action is an unsatis-

factory solution. Affirmative action (that is, quota hiring) is an inequitable

and inefficient method of reducing the income disparity between men and

women because this disparity is not mainly, if at all, the result of discrimin-

ation in the workplace. Furthermore, affirmative action has the side effect

of exacerbating income disparities between rich and poor families and

therefore between rich and poor women. Although affirmative action is

advocated in the name of average and low-income, these women do not

benefit from quota hiring and may experience diminished family income as

a result.

Alternative means of aug m entingfemale incomes

The relative position of women can be improved by bringing changes toincome tax law, pension policy and other traditional policy instruments.

Income tax law can be reformed so as to reduce the gender income gap

while remaining neutral between high- and low-status women and between

those gainfully employed and those at home. Personal income tax deduc-

tions for dependent children and for childcare expenses can be replaced

with generous refundable tax credits, payable to the parent who has the

lower income or has sole legal custody. The refundable tax credit would

be payable to all women regardless of employment status so long as the

56 C. Bradley Scharf, “Correlates of Socia l Security Policy ,” International Political

Science Review (1981), pp. 57-72.

CANADIANPUBLICADMINISTRATION




woman’s income was less tha n he r husband‘s; otherw ise the benefit w ouldgo to the husband. Under present circumstances, the higher-income earner,

usually the husband, normally receives the tax benefit. The proposed re-

fu nd ab le tax credit would constitute a substantial an d ne utral transferpayment to women; it would have equal post-tax value regardless of the

socio-economic or employment status of the recipient. Under present tax

law, childcare deduc tions ar e of v alue only to wom en in t he labou r force

an d are of greatest benefit to those with the highest income. T he prop osed

refu nda ble tax credit would have special meaning to the large n um ber oflow-income families headed by females.

The refundable tax credit would be substantial, absorbing all fore-seen government expenditures in support of institutionalized daycare. By

receiving refundable tax credits in place of direct o r indirect daycare subsi-

dies, women would retain th e choice of finding their ow n solutions to childcare. Hence, mothers of young children would retain personal freedom to

choose am on g full-time work, part-time work, or none a t all an d to choose

amo ng staying home, hiring neighbours or family, or using d aycare .

The rising rate of female participation in the workforce has brought

about a redistribution of income in favour of high-income and high-status

families. T he participation rates amo ng high- a nd low-status wom en ar e so

strikingly different that it is reasonable to conclude that the workforce

participation of wom en has bro ug ht significant benefits to th e high-status

men to whom high-income female employees are married. To pu t a d am per

on these growing income disparities between classes the personal income

tax return should be replaced with the joint return, whereby a person’s

income tax rate is affected by his/her spouse’s income. The joint return

would be of tangible assistance to women in low-to-medium income

families.

Homemakers could be automatically entitled to Canada Pension Plan

benefits. The CPP is not a self-financing plan of the kind which prevail in

the private insurance industry. Un der t he CPP,a given generation of pen-

sioners is supported financially by th e payments m ad e by those generations

still working. It is eq uita ble that homem akers receive benefits. Given Can -ada’s negative rate of reproduction, it is a sensible reform as well.

On e of th e most valuable services which the fe der al government could

provide to women is to make available, a nd to encourage pr ivate industry

to make available, a large nu mb er of part-time an d flexible-time jobs. Scores

of women in and outside the labour force want such part-time and flex-time jobs as a means of remaining in or re-entering the workforce while

carrying out their family responsibilities. I n the same vein, th e fe der al gov-

ernment could explore ways of reducing th e occupational penalty to women

of reduced worklife experience. Countless other means of compensating

women for the occupational and income costs of motherhood could be ex-




CONRAD WINN

plored. For example, mothers could be granted a one-time educational

credit to be used after their child-bearing years. Women in the workforce

could use the credit to regain lost ground vis-a-vis their male competitors

while women outside the workforce could use the credit as a means ofgaining re-entry after their child-bearing role had abated.

Affirmative action is a microcosm of the welfare state. For the past gen-

eration, the welfare state has come under increasing criticism from the

Friedmanite right and from the Marxist left. The Friedmanites are worried

about increased government interference, diminished personal liberty and

diminished efficiency. The Marxists condemn the welfare state for its un-

fulfilled promises to redistribute income. Undaunted, traditional liberals

and social democrats continue to advocate new programs on the unspoken

assumption that good intentions are enough. The neo-liberal position, ex-

hibited in this essay, is that the welfare state can have constructive andredistributive effects only if all the facts of a particular situation are con-

sidered very carefully. The growing empirical literature on the welfare

state shows that the poor do not necessarily benefit from its programs and

that the poor do not necessarily live better under leftwing governments or

because of leftwing social program^.^' Among the industrial democratic

states, the impacts of government regulation and transfer payments are less

redistributive, if at all, than progressive income taxation. The federal

government’s program of affirmative action for women is an example of a

welfare state measure that is advocated in the name of the poor but does

not serve their interest.

57 Robert W. Jackman,Politics and Social Equality N ew York: John Wiley, 1 9 7 5 ) ;Frank Parkin, C h s s Inequality and Political Order N ew York: Praeger, 19 71 ); Winn

and McMenemy, Political Parties, Chap. 12; Francis G . Castles, ed., The Impact o

Political Parties Beverly Hills: Sage, 19 82 ), chap. 6


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- Conrad Winn -- Affirmative Action for Women- More Than a Case of Simple Justice

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